Tag Archives: dying

I Pray For Restraint

I pray for restraint.

I pray that pride will not turn us blind,

This can only result in death.

Drawing all sides to the brink

On what road will there be peace?

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Yes, perhaps lines have been crossed,

But lines can be distorted by wind,

Blurred by anger, smothered with oil,

Causing harried decisions…

This is the time for wisdom not greed.

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Let not egotism ignite Armageddon,

The stakes are far too great.

Have we learned nothing from our past,

Nothing from our present,

Nothing from the farewells to our sons and daughters?

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Tell us almighty, what is victory!

Show us what victory looks like,

We have not seen one in so long!

You ask again for our trust

Yet your truths ring as hollow as ever.

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~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~

Blood Pools – A Tanka

Blood pools on doorstep

Watered down by mothers tears

Limited air strikes

In the end it matters not

A child’s death is permanent

~

~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~

 

The Bog – A Dark Poem

As fading light danced with drifting fog,

Eerily drawn am I towards croak of frog.

Fast approach ‘cross soggy ground

Within an instant airs void of sound.

No frog, no cricket, no mosquitoes buzz,

For just a moment lost I was.

Then sound of sucking, foot in mud,

Terrified of dying, death in cold blood.

In fear for my life standing stone still,

Uncontrollable shivers as if a cold chill.

Slivers of light from cloud covered moon,

Praying to God it would be over soon.

Out of the shadows arose fanged beast,

Reason why sounds of nature had ceased.

Standing a head taller than tallest man I knew,

Sabre from sheath like lightning I drew.

Mustering courage for fear of flight,

I stood my ground determined I would fight.

From the shadow he stalked nose to the wind,

Catching my scent certain I had sinned.

For what reason would God unleash Satan’s fury,

Except in the hopes under bogs mire bury.

The glint of my blade must have captured his eye,

Like a cat through the swamp grass this evil did fly.

With the swipe of his hand claws hit their mark,

For barely a second the whole world went dark.

Such is my luck that the sabre stayed grasped,

Struggling to my feet with a faint thrust he gasped.

Blood on my blade proved the devil had been hit,

He stumbled and roared and crimson he did spit.

Shaking off the fog and the pain in my chest,

Determined to lay this monster to rest.

I trudged through the mud not a second to spare,

With razor sharp edged to the hilt I did bear.

Snapping his jaws his tail cracked like a whip,

Avoiding the fork as I tottered and slipped.

His anger was evident by his blood curdling cry,

To finish him off it was certain do or die.

Taking his tail with one mighty blow,

It continued to move as if putting staging a show.

With beast so distracted by the lose of his tail,

His color of skin turned obsidian to pale.

I drew back once more committed to his end,

Slice through his neck at the spine blade did bend.

As if made of marble all his thrashing came to a stop,

His head tilted forward, to his knees he did drop.

His eyes that did once glow a fiery red,

Turned a dull shade of black, I knew he was dead.

Exhausted and terrified I fell to the ground,

All of natures creatures carried on their sound.

Thing born of nightmares to be consumed by the bog,

Sinking ever slowly ne’er rising hence to slog.

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~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~

Cry Of Somber Horn Sounds

Cry of somber horn sounds,

Cloaked in fogs muted cape;

Lonesome and lonely as others answer not.

With greatest of care she lumbers on,

Waning on autumn wind, she cries,

Longing for her groom so long ago parted.

Drawn and weary her soul aches

In hopes with lover soon united.

He waits…

On rocky shore, he waits,

To hear the joyous cry of his bridegroom,

Against cold and crashing spray–he waits

For her voice, it never comes,

He wales…

For his love–he is forlorn.

She is gone.

~

~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~

Dry Tears

Dry tears dull her cheeks

No more left has she to cry

All has been taken

Her life, joy and only child

Squandered by a tyrant’s hand

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Our inaction screams

Falling upon bloody ears

Looking like cowards

We cower in our corner

Pompous in isolation

~

~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~

Progress – A Tanka

Stacks puff their gray smoke

Debris like a beaver’s dam

Fish…belly up float

Stink of capitalism

Passed as unfettered progress

~

~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~

Simpler Time

To lay in the tall grass

Soaking up summer sun,

I recall a time so much simpler than today,

Carefree, up at dawn, out, exploring,

Seeking out new worlds, new adventures.

Calls for lunch went unheeded,

There just wasn’t the time.

Mother knew, mother always knew

This was part of the plan.

Friends and imagination consumed,

My world for the taking,

King, conqueror, soldier

How I long for those days.

Today kings become tyrants,

Conquerors commit genocide

And soldiers really die.

Games of youth were just silly fun,

There were no consequences,

There was no death, no tyranny.

At the end of the day we’d shake hands,

Smile and run home for dinner,

Dreaming of tomorrow,

Dreaming of our next conquest

From the safety of our beds.

~

~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~

 

Looking Back

Looking back over rounded shoulders,

At friends who’ve long passed;

He can see them like yesterday,

So much like him today.

“Maybe I don’t want to go forward alone”, he thought,

His blanket of bronze and gold

Offering little warmth to his heart grown cold.

His parched lips quiver under mossy beard,

Longing for a sip of cool mountain water.

What lies ahead scares him

Standing at rivers edge.

In his youth no apprehension would he have shown,

His fearlessness bringing out the best in him,

But no longer is he fearless, no longer is he emulous.

Instead he is resigned to spend his life’s remainder…

Waving goodbye to what was

And what might have been.

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~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~

(Words at the Weekend – 17-18 August 2013 prompts)

http://boipoet.wordpress.com/2013/08/17/words-at-the-weekend-17-18-august-2013/

Through The Window Of Time

An old fading brownstone,

For many a decade it has not been alone.

~~

If only we could see what it’s eyes must have seen,

Maybe then we would know where we’re going and where we’ve been.

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The cobblestone streets that lead past it’s front door,

Crumbled from the weather and travelers burdens I’m sure.

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It’s residents present and long ago past,

Have seen what this world has offered to the last.

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The carriage, the train, the automobile,

All graced this place whether wood, iron or steel.

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From street lights of gas or electric lights glow,

They lit up the sights of another nights show.

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So great a loss of life fighting wars on two fronts,

A choice to drop the bomb would end hostilities at once.

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Parades and floats to the sailors joyful kiss,

Soldiers home from war we gratefully would not miss.

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Then a plea to the cops into Korea we did go,

But our hands were handcuffed by the reluctance we did show,

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A stalemate was called that we live under till this day,

Neither a win nor a loss could be granted either way.

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A call for equality from the King did he shout,

With hoods and with nooses the cowards tried to drive them out.

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Watching as a President is taken before his time,

Paying respects in a long and somber funeral procession line.

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The brownstone’s broad eyes did shed tortured tears,

As a people came to terms with an unsure nations fears.

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Ducking behind window boxes from the riots we did hide,

From tear gas and protesters we kept our children safe inside.

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Then there’s the hell of this little place Vietnam,

Over 58.000 lost never to return home.

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To this day we don’t know what it all was all for,

A chapter we’d prefer to lock behind a locked door.

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Then cries for peace and love in song did they roar,

Long hair, love beads and bell bottoms they adorned.

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Three days of love from a Woodstock would live on,

Though Jerry Garcia, Janis and Jimmy are now gone.

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A gas crisis, Beirut and the hostages in Iran,

Oil, our Marines and our citizens held in foreign lands.

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Then along came the Gipper to rescue us from us,

Bringing our people back without much muss or much fuss.

~~

The economy turned around while trickle-down became law,

Taking twenty plus years to find out there was a flaw.

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In 2001 we were brutally attacked,

By suicide bombers that should have been tracked.

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Our World Trade and Pentagon, the heroes in a Pennsylvania field,

So many had died, so many have been killed.

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In retribution and revenge we invaded Iraq,

To topple Saddam and push the Revolutionary Guard back.

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Into Afghanistan we marched as others had before,

With an uneasy partner in Islamabad and Lahore.

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An attempt to democratize third-world tribes,

Costing our mothers their sons and daughters sacred lives.

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Osama Bin Laden is dead at the hands of the Seals,

One more terrorist down knocked back on his heals.

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All to what end I don’t think anybody truly knows,

We’ll wait for history to say, to see how it goes.

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Our economies in turmoil, our politics a disaster,

Compromise and diplomacy no longer can they master.

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Fiscal cliffs and debt ceilings in our sights looming large,

It’s hard to tell if anyone in D. C. is in charge.

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Where we go from here is anyone’s guess,

Raise a glass and make a toast and hope for the best.

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Our past world glories seem far and away,

As we long for that time to be ushered in today.

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Our yesteryear’s are pocked with our failures and successes,

Hoping cooler heads prevail and our virtues to protect us .

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O’ the good and bad this old brownstone must have seen,

The lessons taught through history, I’m hoping we did glean.

~

~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~

 

Today – A Ghazal

O’ my love, why must I suffer this hell today.

Like so many days before, I fell today.

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I’m trying to move on, but my heart won’t allow,

It’s afraid I’ll forget you if I quell today.

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Your passing lives on in my blood and my bones,

Like a mystic potion I’m under it’s spell today.

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Without you my sweet I am no longer whole,

Subsisting as nothing but a broken shell today.

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Tonight I will drop to my knees and I’ll pray

That pain can be confined to it’s cell today.

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Through tears in my eyes, for comfort I look.

There is no one to whom I can tell today.

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So with a heart that is heavy Dom must wish you goodnight,

I’ll bid you adieu and farewell today.

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~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~

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AUTHOR’S NOTE: I have to say that this is the toughest poetic form that I have tried to date.  It requires a great deal of forethought to have it make sense and yet I still am not sure if I succeeded.  If you want to give a new form a try, this might be the one to put you to the test.  It certainly tested me.

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FORM: Ghazal – (Pronunciation: “guzzle”) Originally an Arabic verse form dealing with loss and romantic love, medieval Persian poets embraced the ghazal, eventually making it their own. Consisting of syntactically and grammatically complete couplets, the form also has an intricate rhyme scheme. Each couplet ends on the same word or phrase (the radif), and is preceded by the couplet’s rhyming word (the qafia, which appears twice in the first couplet). The last couplet includes a proper name, often of the poet’s. In the Persian tradition, each couplet was of the same meter and length, and the subject matter included both erotic longing and religious belief or mysticism.